Genetic memory is what we call that “feeling” that some individuals have, where they connect with their ancestors in some strange or unusual way.

Today, such people may be of different religions and nationalities than their ancestors, but still feel an unusual connection – often since childhood – to those ancestors who lived very different lives.

Biologically, we are all links in a chain to our past generations. Can these biological links connect us to our ancestors in different ways?

I'm intrigued by the notion that generations pass on particular survival skills and, perhaps, an unconscious sense of identity that stands the test of centuries. In the case of my own Catholic Carvajal family, I wonder what prompted them to guard the secret of their Sephardic Jewish identity for generations long after the Spanish Inquisition that prompted them to flee to Costa Rica in Central America.